Overrated

One of my all time favorites.

Let me be very fair here, this is not the best movie in my opinion. But, this movie is fun, it has purpose and is very enjoyable to watch.

The movie's neither hopeful in contrived ways, nor hopeless in different contrived ways. Somehow it manages to be wonderful

This is my first "Nurses" movie, an unofficial series (without canon I mean, you can watch them any which way you want I suppose) from Roger Corman's New World Pictures, which started as... well, I'm sure there was some sort of idea from George Armitage and Corman originally, but how it got to Candy Stripe Nurses is mostly due, I'd assume, to economics: these movies made money, as far as they went, and this was one of the later ones. In a way I'm glad I started with this one since I'm sure that it can only go up from here, hopefully anyway, as far as the quality of the writing and acting. Of course, one would argue, I shouldn't expect much quality when it comes to that stuff. This is about young, teenaged-to-20-something aged women in uniforms getting into shenanigans, usually involving their breasts coming out of their outfits. There is some mild attention here to plot, actually three of them, almost with the kind of looseness I'd associate, of all things, with something like Car Wash (that might be due to the LA mid 70's shaggy period flavor): one girl, the Latina one, is brought on as a nurse as a way of curtailing possible juvenile dilenquency, and becomes involved with trying to hunt down the actual culprit of a convenience store robbery as the man who was shot and caught is in the hospital; another woman is (maybe?) attracted to a rock star who has, so to speak, lost his mojo; one last girl (who probably is the "better" actress of the bunch) hooks up with a college jock and helps him with his homework, despite the fact that she's still in high school.Again, it's all soft stuff, and that's fine, but I can't help but try and, you know, pay attention to things when I watch a film like, say, repetitive music or lazy/tired shot compositions, or that there is some acting (Maria Rojo as nurse Marisa Valdez) that would've needed work in a high school production. There's some fun to be had with the story involving the haggard/mojo-less rock star, since that actor seems to get what the context of everything is, and at first some of the music was alright. The rest of the time it felt like a movie that is, even as the first "nurse" movie I've watched, going through the motions of its plot almost exactly as you'd expect... well, maybe not entirely: there IS the part where the basketball jock is somehow allowed behind the wheel to go tearassing around town drunk at night with other nurses in the car with him because... well, the movie needs a climax, don't it?There's also the requisite number of breasts - some quite nice, actually - and, here and there, rapey vibes that perhaps can't be helped given the kind of sleaze we're accepting. I'm not sure what potential there was for this, but I think one legitimate criticism, past going after the performances or (for the most part) the filmmamking in general, is that we don't really get to see much of the girls even *in* the hospital as the nurses doing their work; that might be fine for others, but it seemed odd to have a movie with this title and about 10 minutes of it is spent with the girls actually seeing them do what they do (including, here and there, getting it on with other doctors/patients/etc). Point is, it seems like once I double back to Armitage and Jonathan Kaplan's films, I should likely expect... well, MORE of whatever it is.

Roger Cormans' wife Julie produced this final entry in his "Nurses" sex comedy series. It's actually got a decent enough, easy to follow story (by director Alan Holleb), and even though it might not be trashy enough for some people, it serves up the expected sex and nudity in adequate fashion. Certainly Holleb does a commendable job at following the established formula.Once again, the magic number of nurses whom we follow is three. Candice Rialson is Sandy, who is intrigued when an insufferable rock star (Kendrew Lascelles) is brought to the hospitals' sex clinic for some sort of dysfunction. Robin Mattson, sporting an appealing pixie cut, is Dianne, who is turned on by a jock (Rod Haase). And Maria Rojo is Marisa, a trouble making girl who's given a volunteer job as a candy stripe nurse to keep her occupied. Marisa is moved by a young man who is implicated in a service station robbery, and determines to clear him.Overall, not as memorable as earlier entries in the series, which had more developed social commentaries, but it's very easy to take, very sexy, (with an attractive female cast showing off the goods to great effect), and well paced, with Holleb cramming a fair amount of action and exposition into the final act.Rialson, Mattson, and Rojo are sufficiently appealing, and ably supported by a cast including some old pros (Bill Erwin, Don Keefer, and the great Dick Miller, who once again works his magic as a basketball spectator) and an up and comer (Sally Kirkland makes an appearance as a wife in a clinic).An entertaining romp, with bouncy music by Eron Tabor (the head rapist in the rape-revenge classic "Day of the Woman") & Ron Thompson, and slick photography by Colin Campbell.Seven out of 10.

This movie was yet another follow-up to the hit Roger Corman quickie The Student Nurses and went along similar lines, but had a completely different cast and no story carry-over. Instead of young professionals trying to succeed amid the temptations of the swinging early 70s, though, this time we have high school aged volunteers. The cast are all inexperienced unknowns (Candace Rialson went on to do a fair amount of TV work over the next few years), but the real problem is that while the advertising promises laughs, the script doesn't provide any. The box copy suggests a hospital romp along the lines of Carry On Doctor, but the movie just gives us 90 minutes of following the girls around in their silly peppermint striped uniforms, and then off to parties where they smoke dope, take off their tops and have sex. Tame sex. Nothing else of much interest happens. Unlike the first movie, where every major character had a proper character arc, there is little here in the way of character development. We just get a few familiar types (the rebel, the serious student who wants to be a doctor, the party girl) and some standard antagonists (insensitive sexist doctors, rigid administrators etc.) for them to conflict with. The result is more hospital soap than romp and not very interesting or entertaining. The girls are pretty hot, though, and this one isn't quite as insanely trashy as Private Duty Nurses, making it a little more watchable (or a little less watchable, depending on what you're looking for).

Let's see if I got the plot to "Candy Stripe Nurses" correct. I believe it went something like this: topless woman, topless woman, naked woman, topless woman, naked woman, topless woman, 2(!!) topless women. There was also a subplot about one of the nurses trying to help a patient beat a charge of armed robbery.In all seriousness, I rather enjoyed parts of this movie. I know this is going to be hard to believe, but the acting by the women playing the nurses was wonderful. Usually the women in these types of movies simply have to speak English and look good without their clothes on. (Although sometimes the speaking English part isn't necessary.) Every one of the actresses in "Candy Stripe Nurses" did an admirable job and all of their characters were sympathetic ones. That really helped to partially overcome the cheesy plot. I've seen A LOT worse '70s movies similar to this one. Kinda fun little flick...but nothing that'll blow you away. 4/10